It's wounding. In the same way, you know how much it blesses you when your child is able to see and recognize that you love and care for them. It does happen. I promise it does happen. That's how God feels about the way we interact with Him, and that's why faith is such a big deal to Him.
And it's why Hebrew 11:6 declares, that without faith, it is impossible to please God since the one who draws near to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek Him. Here's where things get a little crazy, especially for those of us who have been around the church and the Bible for a while. Scripture teaches God judges people based upon the revelation they have received, not the revelation they have not received. And we can wrap our heads around that as it relates to eternal issues like who gets into heaven.
We can say, oh, okay, that makes sense to me that there will be people in heaven who maybe don't even know the full gospel, but they've responded to what they did know. But here's where it gets crazy, is that this principle can affect even the here and now. God will interact with people differently here and now. Based on how they're responding to the revelation they have received, an incredible number of people with incomplete and horrendously flawed beliefs about God were healed at the hands of Jesus and the apostles. And this happened for two reasons.
Here's why it happened. Number one, they responded in faith to the revelation they had received about God. All some of them knew and understood was that the God Paul was preaching about was the all-powerful God who was greater than all others. God had the power to heal, and he rewards those who seek Him. That's all they knew.
But what did they do with that knowledge? They responded in faith. They did everything they could to make contact with God by touching the hem of Jesus' robe or stealing one of Paul's sweat cloths. They responded in faith to the revelation they had about God, even though that revelation was woefully incomplete. 'Second reason people with bad theology got healed...
Write this down. They placed their faith in the right thing, Jesus. They placed their faith in the right thing, Jesus. Now, we live in a world that wants to believe that if you just believe something strong enough, then it must be true. We hear this when we use phrases like, well, what's true for you is true for you, and what's true for me is true for me.
Or when we talk about phrases like your truth, as though your truth can be different from the truth, and the philosophy behind that is actually the belief. No, if you just believe something strong enough, then it's true.
This is like Disney children's level stupidity. Just believe it. Just wish upon a star and it'll be true. A lot of areas that I could point out, but I'll show some restraint in that area right now. Suffice it to say, that you can believe something with all your heart and be completely wrong, and it will not make it true even if you believe it with all your heart.
Now imagine we're in a plane, and that plane is going down, but we have a chance to jump and land safely. You are given a choice between a parachute or an umbrella to aid you in your journey to the ground. Now, let me ask you if you have all the faith in the world, you believe with all your heart and soul that that umbrella is going to save your life. Does that mean you're loving to jump out the plane and float down like Mary freaking Poppins to the ground? No, of course not.
Why? Because the issue is not, first and foremost, how much faith you have. The issue, first and foremost, is the object you have placed your faith in. A little faith in something powerful will accomplish far more than much faith in something useless. A little faith in something with the power to heal and save you will accomplish a lot more than all the faith in the world in something that cannot heal and cannot save.
I mean, it's so off base, I wouldn't even know how to begin explaining to those people how messed up their theology is. And yet it's far from the only example we see in the scriptures of people being healed despite their bad theology and wrong beliefs. The most obvious parallel is the woman with the issue of blood. The story BJ read to us. Let me remind you of her interaction with Jesus.
I'm going to blend some verses together from Matthew nine and Mark five, and they're on your outlines so you can follow along. It says, a woman suffering from bleeding for twelve years had endured much under many doctors. She had spent everything she had and was not helped at all. On the contrary, she became worse. Having heard about Jesus, she approached from behind and touched the end of his robe, for she said to herself, if I can just touch his robe, I'll be made well, it's basically the same theology that was driving people to steal Paul's sweat cloths and aprons in Ephesus. She believes that Jesus' healing power flows from his body to his clothing and will transfer to her if she can just make contact with the hem of his robe. It's terrible theology. And yet we read, instantly her flow of blood ceased, and she senses in her body that she was healed of her affliction. Immediately Jesus realized that power had gone out from him.
He turned around in the crowd and said, who touched my clothes? His disciples said to him, you see the crowd pressing against you, and yet you say, who touched me? But he was looking around to see who had done this. The woman with fear and trembling, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell down before him and told him the whole truth.
Jesus speaking to her just always messes me up. Have courage, daughter, he said, your faith has saved you. And the actual translation there is, Your faith has made you well. And the woman was made well from that moment. And then one chapter later in Mark's Gospel, we read this about Jesus also on your outlines.
Wherever he went into villages, towns, or the country, they laid the sick in the marketplaces and begged him that they might touch just the end of his robe. Come on, guys. But wait. And everyone who touched it was healed. The bad theology spread just as it did in Ephesus with Paul's Sweat.
And yet people are healed. I mean, someone's got to explain to Jesus that this is bad right now. Why is this happening? Well, I believe we heard the answer in Jesus' words to the woman with the issue of blood. He told her, Your faith has made you well.
Your faith has made you well. Now, what is Jesus talking about when he refers to faith in that context? Write this down and we'll talk about it. Faith is the belief that God is who he says he is. And faith is evidenced by our actions.
Faith is the belief that God is who he says he is, and it's evidenced by our actions because our actions reveal what we truly believe, don't they? Faith is such a big deal to God because our actions either reveal the way we live our lives, either reveal that we really believe that God is who he says he is a good, loving, and faithful God who cares for his children, or our actions reveal we don't really believe that he is who he says he is. When we trust God, it's revealed by our actions. And when we don't trust God, it's revealed by our actions. And we're calling Him a liar.
We're accusing Him of being a fraud. That's why faith is such a big deal to God. Those of you who are parents will understand this intrinsically. How offensive is it when your child treats you and acts like you are not God and loving and, you know, all my life all I've done is love and care for you? It's deeply offensive.
But he no longer empowers individuals with the ability to regularly perform miracles as he did the apostles during the first few decades of the Church as the Gospel was spreading across the world. But it's interesting to note that miracles seem to most frequently happen today in places where people can't read the Scriptures, either because they're illiterate, the Bible hasn't been translated into their language, or because Bibles are illegal or almost impossible to obtain. And in places still steeped in supernaturalism. In those places, there is often a regular stream of testimonies from missionaries who report that God is doing miracles to authenticate the Gospel being shared by his messengers. So, here's the bottom line - and I wrote this out on your outline for you...
The anointing of the apostles to perform regular, extraordinary miracles was unique, especially during the first few decades of the Church. The purpose of that unique anointing was to authenticate their Gospel preaching and writings as authoritative and divine. In other words, coming from God. God was doing two unique things through his apostles that would never be repeated in history. He was establishing the Church, and he was authoring the New Testament.
Today, the Lord expects us to judge all teaching by His Word. God still does miracles, but he no longer empowers individuals with the same unique anointing he placed upon the apostles. So, when we read that God was performing extraordinary miracles by Paul's hands, it was normal Apostle stuff for the first few decades of the Church. And we want to note that in V.11 we're told that it was God who was working the miracles by Paul's hands. God was the power.
Paul was the instrument through which God's power was flowing. Now, verse twelve tells us about some of the extraordinary miracles that were happening through Paul. It says so that even face lots, the original word there is actually sweat lots or aprons. And these would have been the leather aprons that Paul wore when he worked in Aquila and Priscilla's workshop. So sweat cloths or aprons that had touched his skin, Paul's skin were brought to the sick and the diseases left them and the evil spirits came out of them.
It was a common superstitious belief at this time that magical power could be transferred from one person to another through a point of contact. Some people in and around Ephesus who had loved ones who were bedridden with sickness heard about Paul's miracle-working power and thought, if I can't get them to Paul, I'll get Paul to them. And in their mind, the way to do this was to get their hands on something that had been in contact with Paul's person. Now, something he had sweated in was just ideal, because in their minds, Paul's magic powers might be deeply imprinted upon that object. So when the workshop was empty, people started sneaking in and they're stealing Paul's sweat cloths and stealing his aprons, which had to get frustrating after a while.
I mean, I'm sure at first Paul must have thought he was losing his mind before he figured out what was going on. I left it right here; I know I did. And these people would then take those sweat cloths or aprons back to their loved one who was ill. And here's the crazy part they would be healed when they touched it for real.
The diseases left them, and the evil spirits came out of them. So, what in the world do you do with that? Because it is undeniably strange. We've already discussed why God was moving so powerfully through the apostles at this time. But the part that is puzzling, at least to me, is just how bad the theology seems to be.
Series: Act...Passage: Acts 19:11-1.....Speaker: Jeff Thompson
In Ephesus, a strange phenomenon occurs as people are miraculously healed by touching Paul's sweat cloths and aprons. We'll dig into what was happening, why, and what it can teach us about supernatural healing in the Church today.
Well, as we return to our study through the Book of Acts, we find ourselves in chapter 19. Paul is on his third missionary journey, and he has returned to the city of Ephesus, where he is enjoying three of his most profitable years in ministry, a season many scholars consider to be the pinnacle of his ministry history career. And today we're going to look at just two verses because they are on the surface, so strange. And I'm so grateful, actually for these two verses, because by a whisker we have managed to avoid having to talk about the sons of Sceva on a family Sunday with kids here. And those who know will understand why that's a good thing.
But the two verses we're going to talk about today open up a lot of questions that need to be answered. They lead us into the frequently misunderstood subjects of faith and supernatural healing and the relationship between the two. So, let's get into it. In Acts chapter 19, verse 11, it says God. Would you underline the word God?
God was performing extraordinary miracles with Paul's hands. And if you've been with us through most of our study, through the Book of Acts, then you'll know that God worked extraordinary miracles on a regular basis through the Apostles - the surviving members of the twelve apostles chosen by Jesus, the twelve Disciples, and Paul - the Lord did this to authenticate their ministry in a world steeped in supernaturalism. These extraordinary miracles proved the Apostles were teaching about a God greater than any other and that their message was divine.
It was from God. If you were with us a few years ago when we went through the Book of Exodus, you may recall that part of the reason for the plagues of Egypt was God demonstrating that he was infinitely greater and more powerful than the gods of Egypt. And a similar dynamic was in play in Ephesus. It was a city steeped in magic and occultism. And through Paul, God was displaying his superiority over all other gods and powers in the region.
These extraordinary miracles also proved the Apostles were authorized by God to write the Scriptures we know today as the New Testament. After the first few decades of the Church, it seems that the Lord no longer worked through the Apostles to perform miracles with the same frequency. They still happened, but with nowhere near the frequency and regularity we see during the first few decades of the Church. In Paul's first letter to Timothy, his pastoral protege, he advises Timothy to drink a little wine to help with his stomach pains and frequent illnesses.
Frequent illnesses. In his last letter, 2 Timothy Paul writes that he had to leave a brother named Trophimus in a city called Miletus because Trophimus was sick. Now. Why didn't Paul just heal Timothy and Trophimus? Because something changed after the first few decades of the Church.
God was still working miracles, but not with the same frequency we see during the first few decades of the Church. Now, why the change? I suggest because by then there was something new and available that God wanted his people to use to Jude between true and false teaching. Most of the New Testament scriptures. God doesn't expect us today to judge teaching by whether the preacher can perform miracles.
He expects us to judge it according to His Word. He expects us to weigh the teaching we hear by comparing it to His Word. If it lines up, we are to accept it. If it doesn't line up, we are to reject it. Does God still do miracles? Absolutely.
Son of Jehoita, the priest. He stood above the people and said to them, this is what God says. Why are you transgressing the Lord's command so that you do not prosper? Because you have abandoned the Lord. He has abandoned you.
But they conspired against him and stoned him at the king's command. In the courtyard of the Lord's temple, King Josh didn't remember the kindness that Zechariah's father, Jojoida had extended to him, but killed his son while he was dying. He said, May the Lord see and demand an account. Zechariah was a prophet and a righteous man who was speaking the truth, empowered by the Spirit. However, his final prayer was that God would judge his murderers and avenge his death.
Jesus and Stephen died praying for their murderers. Father, forgive them because they do not know what they are doing. Lord, do not hold this sin against them. To state the obvious, that is not a normal human reaction toward those who are murdering you. It is not natural.
It is supernatural. It is a love that comes from God and can only be found in God. And the only way it ever comes out of a human being is if God puts it in them. Paul said it like this in Romans chapter five god's love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us. Only a Christian full of the Holy Spirit and the love of God can love in this radical kind of way.
It's not a human love. Stephen serves as the model disciple, the model martyr, as he imitates Jesus in life and in death. The similarities between Stephen's words and deeds and those of Jesus were not contrived. It was the natural behavior and speech of a man who was full of the same spirit that filled Jesus. Stephen died steadfastly, doing the will of his Lord Jesus, and the things of this world grew strangely dim.
The hatredfilled faces of his killers faded away and they were replaced by the smiling face of his savior, Jesus, who greeted Stephen as a friend with open arms and the words Well done, good and faithful servant. When I examine the little that scripture tells us about the life and ministry of Stephen, I am astounded. And I find myself asking, has there ever been a man more like Jesus than Stephen?
This episode ends with the first part of the first verse chapter 8. Saul agreed to put him to death. Stephen, the first martyr, deserves to be honored and remembered. The best way to honor his memory is to imitate his devotion to serving Jesus, loving his church, and boldly proclaiming the truth. To be a follower of Jesus means we want to be like him.
We want to be like him in life. And if circumstances demand it, we want to be like him in death. I'll close with these few scriptures. Jesus said if the world hates you, understand that it hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love you. However, because you are not of the world. But I have chosen you out of it. The world hates you. Remember the word I spoke to you? A servant is not greater than his master.
If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If anyone wants to follow after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross daily, and follow me. Whoever wants to save his life will lose it. But whoever loses his life because of me will save it. For what does it benefit someone if he gains the whole world and yet loses?
Or forfeits himself? For whoever is ashamed of me. In my words, the Son of man will be ashamed of him when he comes in his glory and that of the Father and the Holy Angels. And the man who orchestrated Stephen's murder, who would be transformed by the love of God into the apostle Paul wrote if we live, we live for the Lord and if we die, we die for the Lord. Therefore, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord.
And the witnesses laid their garments at the feet of a young man named Saul. This is our introduction to the man better known as the Apostle Paul, the one who would go on to become the greatest church planter, evangelist, and pastor in history. Oh, yeah, and also write about a third of the New Testament. The Book of Acts is written by Luke, a physician and historian who would later become a traveling companion of Paul's. And this fascinates me because Luke wasn't there when the Sanhedrin tried and executed Stephen.
By all accounts, the apostles weren't there either. So how did Luke learn what happened at Stephen's trial? What Stephen said? The most logical answer is that Paul told him that the men stoning Stephen who laid their garments at Saul's feet, suggest that he was the initiator and driving force behind the Sanhedrin's prosecution of Stephen. Saul was likely already the ending voice in opposition to Christianity.
He wasn't taking a let's wait and see approach, as some of his elders were, Saul's view was these followers of Jesus were an abomination who taught blasphemies and must be eliminated. Another side note for you the term young man likely refers to someone between the ages of 24 and 40. Saul was not a teenager or a young adult, as we might think when we read that phrase. Verse 59. While they were stoning Stephen, he called out, Lord Jesus underline Lord Jesus.
Lord Jesus received my spirit. He knelt down and cried out with a loud voice, lord, underline Lord, do not hold this sin against them. And after saying this, he fell asleep. When Jesus was hanging on the cross about to die, he cried out, Father, into your hands I entrust my spirit. As Stephen is about to die, he cries out, lord Jesus, receive my spirit.
Jesus committed himself to the Father. Stephen committed himself to Jesus, testifying that Jesus is God and equal to the Father. Steven's words reveal that he expected to be with the Lord the moment he died. He did not expect to awaken, into purgatory, or enter some sort of soul sleep because this is what Scripture teaches. Paul wrote that if he was away from his earthly body, it meant he would be at home with the Lord.
He also wrote that departing this earthly life would mean being with Christ. Jesus promised the thief on the cross beside him that he would be with him in paradise that very day. And there are other examples I could share. About to die on the cross, Jesus cried out, Father, forgive them because they do not know what they are doing. Stephen cries out Lord, do not hold this sin against them.
Stephen affirms the reality of Jesus's words in John chapter five, where he said the Father in fact judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son so that all people may honor the Son, just as they honor the Father. Stephen cannot offer forgiveness and salvation to those who shout down and cover their ears to the truth, so he prays that God would forgive them, continue reaching out to them, and work a miracle in their lives. And if you know the story of the Book of Acts, I want you to take heart and to be encouraged. Because in the life of at least one man, Stephen's prayer for his hard-earned brethren would be answered to a degree more wonderful and astounding than he could ever have imagined. As Augustine wrote, if Stephen had not prayed, the Church would not have had Paul saints.
Do not give up praying for even the most hardhearted person. Don't give up God. Put them in your life for a reason. What is impossible with man is possible with God. Do not give up.
Persist in prayer for them. The final words of Jesus and Stephen, as they are being wrongly put to death, reveal the difference between the Old and New Covenants. In two Chronicles 24, we read of the murder of the prophet Zechariah. And I want you to notice both the similarities and the differences in the death of Stephen. It says the Spirit of God enveloped Zechariah.
To give Stephen the strength he needs to endure what's about to happen, the Lord opens his eyes to see into the spiritual dimension and he sees heaven, he sees where he's about to go. Verse 55 tells us he saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. In his address, Stephen referred to times past when the glory of God had appeared to Abraham and Moses, and now he Himself joins their ranks as he witnesses this remarkable vision of the glorified Son of God. The only other men in Scripture who were blessed with a glimpse of heaven were Isaiah, Ezekiel, Paul, and John. And Stephen is the first to see Jesus in his glorified state after his ascension, further enraging the Sanhedrin.
Stephen's vision testifies that the Jesus they murdered is indeed alive, has been glorified, and will judge those who reject him. In Psalm 110, Ephesians 1, and Hebrews 1 and 8, we are told that the Father raised Jesus from the dead and seated him at his right hand. David prophesied that Jesus would remain seated at the Father's right hand until the time of judgment known as the day of the Lord arrived. We see Jesus stand for that future time in prophecies found in Isaiah two, Isaiah three, Daniel seven, and Revelation five. But this was not the day of the Lord. Yet.
Stephen though, saw Jesus standing at the right hand of God. And as best we can tell, the reason Jesus was standing was to welcome Stephen into his presence. Verse 56 says that Stephen said, look, I see the heavens opened and the Son of man standing at the right hand of God. When Jesus was on trial before the Sanhedrin, he said, I tell you, in the future you will see the Son of man seated at the right hand of power and coming on the clouds of heaven. And this is how they reacted at that time to those words by Jesus then the high priest tore his robes and said, he has blasphemed.
Why do we still need witnesses? See? Now you've heard the blasphemy. What is your decision? They answered, he deserves death.
Stevens vision and testimony affirmed Jesus words to the Sanhedrin that he was and is the Son of man of Daniel, chapter seven, who will rule over and judge the nations, including these men? Jesus was who he said he was, is where he said he would go and will do in the future. What he said he would do. Stephen is telling them, the righteous one whom you murdered is right now glorified and at the right hand of the Father in heaven. They judge Jesus worthy of death for speaking the truth.
And here's how they respond when Stephen does the same. Verse 5/7. They yelled at the top of their voices, covered their ears, and together rushed against him. They yelled and covered their ears to prevent themselves from hearing any more of Stephen's testimony to the glorified Jesus. You see, unless they were willing to recognize their grievous error in arranging the murder of Jesus and repent, they had no logical choice but to likewise find Stephen guilty of blasphemy as they had found Jesus.
The Greek word used by Luke, that's translated rushed, is the same word used to describe the demonpossessed herd of pigs as they charged into the Sea of Galilee. In Matthew chapter eight and Mark chapter five, the idea is that these men were demonically inspired to oppose the truth Stephen was speaking, and they eagerly gave themselves over to baseless rage, anger, and hatred. They turned into a frenzied mob. At this point, it says, they dragged him out of the city and began to stone him. The scene is reminiscent of Luke, chapter four, where Jesus's own townsman in Nazareth, enraged by his speaking the truth, dragged him outside the town to try and throw him off a cliff.
You cannot suddenly change from someone who doesn't believe in the promises of God to someone who does. Just because you recognize the situation now really requires that of you. You cannot suddenly change from someone with no demonstrable faith in God to someone with great faith. And you cannot change from someone who is controlled by the flesh to someone who is controlled by the spirit. Christian, I beg you, do not fool yourself.
Don't fool yourself. I really don't care if what I've said or what I'm about to say offends you because it's true and I'm saying it because I love you and I want you to follow Jesus with everything you have. But listen, if you don't have the faith to trust God with money, with dollars and cents, why would you expect to have the faith? To trust God through cancer? You're delusional.
You're fooling yourself. If you don't have the faith to even identify yourself as a Christian to your friends, peers, or coworkers. If you never want to let on that the reason you're busy on Sunday is because you're going to church, why would you expect to be able to stand firm for Jesus when real persecution comes, and it will, you're fooling yourself. I'm not talking about being the kind of mature Christian that takes years and years to become. I'm talking about the kind of maturity of understanding that any believer can begin walking in today.
It's about saying, I will do everything I can to obey Jesus as best as I know how right now. And as soon as I learn that there's something else I should be doing to obey Jesus or that I need a change in my life, I will do it as quickly as I can. I'll spend time with Him and ask Him to fill me with his spirit every day. That's what I'm talking about. The question for each of us is, who am I right now?
Who are you right now? If a crisis or persecution explodes in your life tomorrow, who will you be? Who will the person be going into that crisis or experiencing that persecution? I can tell you that person will be who you are right now, who you are right now. And so if you need to change anything in your life to change who you are right now, then do it.
Because the crisis and the persecution rarely arrive with six to eight weeks advance notice. When his moment of life-or-death persecution arrived, Stephen was the same man that he was when he woke up that morning. A man full of the Holy Spirit, wisdom, faith, grace, and power. In contrast to the demonically inspired rage of his adversaries, Stephen's face continued to glow with the radiance of God's presence, and he was empowered with supernatural boldness and peace.
God gives special grace to believers to enable them to stand firm in the face of persecution and martyrdom. Peter wrote if you are ridiculed for the name of Jesus, you are blessed because the spirit of glory and of God rests on you. Stephen serves as the prototype of the believer filled with this special grace, and his example has been repeated in the lives of millions of believers over the past 2000 years. When the apostle Paul was troubled by a specific issue, he asked the Lord for deliverance, and he received this reply my grace is sufficient for you, for my power is perfected in weakness. This changed Paul's perspective, leading him to write so I take pleasure in weaknesses, in insults, hardships, persecutions, and difficulties for the sake of Christ, for when I am weak, then I am strong.
Stephen is saying I'm not guilty of blaspheming Moses in the Law. I revere both. It is you who do not revere either, for if you did, you would have recognized and welcomed Jesus as the Messiah. Everything Stephen has shared is about to be proven true to the greatest possible degree. For Stephen is about to be murdered.
The Sanhedrin are about to follow in the footsteps of their forefathers. Stephen is about to take his place in the prophetic line, joining the great men of antiquity who testified fearlessly to the truth at the cost of their lives. Stephen is about to follow in the footsteps of his Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. When the Sanhedrin heard these things, they were enraged and gnashed their teeth at him. To Nash, one's teeth is to be so enraged that you grind your teeth in anger and hostility.
In the Old Testament, it's often used to describe the hatred that the wicked feel toward the righteous. In the Gospels, it's the attitude displayed by the wicked toward God when it's revealed they are not part of his kingdom. They don't repent, they just gnash their teeth. The Holy Spirit is convicting these men. Their innermost motivations have been laid bare by Stephen's Spirit-empowered address.
But like their forefathers, they refuse to repent. They simply become enraged toward God's messenger. In Acts chapter 2 on the day of Pentecost, we saw a very different reaction from thousands of people when Peter told them, let all the house of Israel know with certainty that God has made this Jesus whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah. It says, that when they heard this, they were pierced to the heart. The phrase they were pierced to the heart is very similar in the original Greek to the phrase we just read in Acts 7/54.
That's translated, they were enraged. In Acts chapter 2, their hearts were pierced by the truth. In Acts chapter 7, the original Greek is even more intense. Their hearts were cut into. They were torn asunder by the truth.
Here's how they responded to Peter's appeal. In Acts chapter 2, they said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, brothers, what should we do? Peter replied, Repent and be baptized, each of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you, your children, and all who are far off as many as the Lord our God will call. The conviction of the Holy Spirit generally produces either repentance or increases one's hardness of heart toward the truth.
Acts chapter 7 is a sobering reminder that many will perish, not because they don't know the truth, not because they haven't seen it, not because it hasn't been told to them, but because they don't want to repent. They don't want to repent. Jesus explained this to Nicodemus in John chapter 3 when he told him this is the judgment. The light has come into the world, and people love the darkness rather than the light because their deeds are evil. For everyone who does evil hates the light and avoids it so that his deeds may not be exposed.
Jesus's words were proven true by the response of the Sanhedrin to Stephen's truthful testimony. Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit underlined, full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven. Now, notice that Stephen did not become full of the Holy Spirit in this moment. He was already full of the Holy Spirit. Back in Act Six /five and Act Six Eight, it was the way that Stephen lived his life.
When a crisis hits your life, when persecution comes, when pressure pushes down on you, you are who you are at that moment. You are who you are at that moment. Here's what I mean. I mean, there's no switch that you can flick to suddenly become somebody else. You cannot suddenly change from someone who is casual about their faith to someone who is deeply committed to their faith.
They were just misrepresenting God by turning, serving, and following him into misery. Woe to you. You build tombs for the prophets, and your fathers killed them. Therefore, you are witnesses that you approve the deeds of your fathers, for they killed them, and you build their monuments. Because of this, the wisdom of God said, I will send them prophets and apostles, and some of them they will kill and persecute, so that this generation may be held responsible for the blood of all the prophet shed since the foundation of the world, from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who perished between the altar and the sanctuary.
Yes, I tell you, this generation will be held responsible. These men would turn the tombs of the prophets into shrines and places of veneration and even pilgrimage. Jesus calls this behavior ridiculous because he says your hearts are exactly the same as your forefathers, and your forefathers were the ones who killed them in the first place. Scripture tells us these religious leaders would say at the time of Jesus, well, if we had lived in the days of our ancestors, we wouldn't have taken part in the shedding of the prophet's blood, but the Lord knew they would soon kill him, the greatest of all the prophets and the Messiah showing themselves to be exactly like their forefathers. Woe to you, experts in the Law.
You have taken away the key to knowledge. You didn't go in yourselves, and you hindered those who were trying to go in. Jesus says you don't understand the heart of the law, and then you teach a wrong interpretation of the law to people, preventing them from ever being able to understand the true heart of the Law. When he that's Jesus left there, the scribes and the Pharisees began to oppose him fiercely. And we see the same thing happening here with Stephen and the Sanhedrin.
Steven continues speaking about their forefathers. We can turn back to the Book of Acts. Acts, chapter seven, the rest of verse 52. They even killed those who foretold the coming of the Righteous One, whose betrayers and murderers you have now become. Steven is rebuking the Sanhedrin by pointing out how perfectly they fit into the pattern of their ancestors.
Their ancestors killed those who prophesied the coveting Messiah, and now they have taken their place in their family line by taking things to their inevitable conclusion betraying and murdering the Messiah, the Righteous one prophesied by the prophets, their ancestors killed too. You received the Law under the direction of angels, and yet have not kept it. They knew that Stephen refers to in this verse is the Sanhedrin, sitting before him, the nation of Israel collectively, and their ancestors. He says, you, Israel received the Law under the direction of angels at Mount Sinai, and yet you have not kept it. As we mentioned in our previous study, while God was giving the Law to Moses through angels on top of Mount Sinai, Israel was at the foot of the mountain, demanding Eren make an idol for them so that they could worship it instead of Yahweh.
The whole reason God created the nation of Israel was to have a people dedicated to Himself, who would represent them to the nations of the earth and invite them to be part of his family. The culmination, the crescendo of Israel's mission was always intended to be the arrival of Messiah who would bring salvation to all peoples and fulfill the words of the prophets spoken over the centuries. And yet Israel failed to even recognize her Messiah. When he arrived, Jesus condemned the insincerity of Israel's religious devotion, telling them, you pour over the Scriptures because you think you have eternal life in them, and yet they testify about me. And if you believed Moses, you would believe me, because he wrote about me.
Jesus was saying, how like you to care about outside cleanliness. Don't you know that God cares more about what's going on in the heart? You religious leaders have perfected the art of looking clean on the outside while being absolutely filthy on the inside and full of ugliness fools. Didn't he who made the outside make the inside too, but give from what is within to the poor, and then everything is clean for you? He's saying if you worried more about what was going on inside your own heart, if you had a heart that truly loved the Lord, good works would flow from the heart and God would be pleased by them.
And God wouldn't care about any of the outside stuff, because if the inside loves the Lord, then the outside is clean as well because everything that flows out will be good and will be pleasing to God. Unlike trying to do good things with an impure heart, that's not pleasing to the Lord. But woe to you, Pharisees. You give a 10th of mint, rue, and every kind of herb and you bypass justice and love for God. These things you should have done without neglecting the others.
He says you're tithing to God from your spice rack. You're that concerned about getting the law right, but you don't even care about justice for the people and you have no real love for God at all. Woe to you, Pharisees. You love the front seat in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces. He says you love the public attention you get for the positions you've created for yourselves, for the public persona that you've created.
Woe to you. You are like unmarked graves. The people who walk over them don't know it. Under the law, if you came into contact with a grave, you would become ceremonially unclean and would have to go through ceremonial cleansing rituals, which would take several days. It was really inconvenient.
And so it was a big thing in Israel that if you bury the bones of somebody anywhere, you really had to mark their grave clearly. And then you also had to keep it clean. You had to go back and paint it white over and over and over again so that it didn't just blend in, lest somebody accidentally walk over it, then realize they've done so and have to go through all the ceremonial rituals. And so what Jesus is saying. He says you guys are like unmarked graves, so people walk over you.
They don't know that it's a place of death, but then they get infected with it. Jesus is saying people who hang out with you and come into contact with you get infected by sin and death the same way that somebody would become ceremonially unclean under the law if they walked over an unmarked grave. I don't think I've ever been to a dinner that was this awkward before. I cannot imagine the awkwardness. And it gets even better, because one of the experts in the law answered him, captain Obvious over here, teacher, when you say these things, you insult us too.
Then he Jesus said, oh, my apologies for not being more inclusive. Woe also to you, experts in the law. You load people with burdens that are hard to carry, and yet you yourselves don't touch these burdens with one of your fingers. The scribes and religious scholars would work with the Pharisees and Sadducees to add hundreds of additional laws to the law of God, turning obeying God into an unbearable burden. And to make matters worse, the men who were adding all these additional unbiblical laws were doing nothing to even help the people keep them.
This was a Hebrew idiom intended to conjure the image of someone who refuses to bow before God, someone who is in stubborn rebellion against the Lord. It's the term God used for the Israelites immediately following their idolatry with the golden calf at Mount Sinai. And then, Stephen says, with uncircumcised hearts and ears. Circumcision, as you may know, was a right given by God to Abraham. It marked God's people physically as distinct from the pagan Gentiles around them, who had their own physical marks to identify themselves and their ethnicity and their pagan gods.
It was a physical indicator that the Israelites belonged to God. The Jews were very proud of their unique status as the people of God, and so, therefore, they were very proud of Circumcision, as weird as that might sound to us today, when Stephen says they have uncircumcised hearts and ears, he's saying that while they've marked their bodies as God's property, their hearts and ears do not belong to God and are not dedicated to God. In fact, their hearts and ears are in an identical spiritual condition to those of the pagan Gentiles, in that they do not want to hear the truth and they do not want to respond to the conviction of the Holy Spirit in their hearts. God had used this language of their forefathers in the Book of Leviticus. Moses had used it when speaking to the people in the Book of Deuteronomy.
Jeremiah, the prophet had used it when appealing to the men of Israel to repent, writing things like, who can I speak to? And give such a warning that they will listen. Look, their ear is uncircumcised, so they cannot pay attention. See, the word of the Lord has become contemptible to them. They find no pleasure in it.
You see, even in his rebuke of the Sanhedrin, Steven is using language connected to Scripture that makes the point. They are following in the footsteps of their stubborn and rebellious ancestors by rejecting God's chosen messenger to them on a spiritual level, they are as lost in their sins as the pagan Gentiles are. He says you are always resisting the Holy Spirit as your ancestors did. You do also. Which of the prophets did your ancestors not persecute?
As I've shared repeatedly throughout Stephen's address, the Israelis persecuted and or murdered all the prophets. Moses tradition says they put Isaiah inside a dead tree trunk and sawed it in half. They threw Jeremiah into the dungeon several times before finally stoning him to death, and they killed Zechariah inside the temple. Jesus lamented this tragic pattern of stubbornness when he wept over Israel, crying, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets?
Stephen is clearly walking in the footsteps of Jesus as he confronts the religious leaders. Turn with me, if you would, to Luke, chapter eleven. Just put something in your Bible where we're at in Act 7 and turn a couple of books back to Luke chapter 11. We'll begin in verse 37 because I want us to see how Jesus interacted with the religious leaders who had uncircumcised hearts and ears.
Some of the religious leaders in this interaction with Jesus were likely there with Stephen at the Sanhedrin at this time. In Luke 11/37, we read he that Jesus, was speaking, a Pharisee asked him to dine with him. So we went in and reclined at the table. When the Pharisees saw this, he was amazed that he did not first perform the ritual washing before dinner. But the Lord said to him, now you Pharisees, clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside you are full of greed and evil.
Write this down by limiting God's presence and power to the temple, the Sanhedrin were blaspheming. By making the temple greater than God. By limiting God's presence and power to the temple, the Sanhedrin were blaspheming. By making the temple greater than God. The words immediately following the quote that Stephen pulls from Isaiah are revelatory in our discussion.
After pointing out that he has no need for a house because no house can contain him, the Lord speaks through the prophet and says, this is the Lord's declaration. I will look favorably on this kind of person, one who is humble, submissive or broken in spirit, and trembles at my word. David wrote the same thing in Psalm 50/ 117 the sacrifice pleasing to God is a broken spirit. You will not despise a broken and humbled heart. God and Jesus began the Sermon on the Mount with the Beatitude blessed are the poor in spirit, for the kingdom of heaven is theirs.
All these scriptures make the same point. God has never been foremost interested in a temple and rituals and religion. He has always been blessed most by the same thing a heart that sees itself and the Lord clearly a heart that knows it resides in a broken sinned, recognizes that God is holy and glorious, perceives the incalculable gap between the two, and seeks grace and mercy from the Lord, fully aware that it deserves neither. God's presence has always resided among his people, and the sacrifice he has always found most pleasing is a humble heart belonging to those who know they are poor in spirit. Therefore, it should not be surprising that God who cannot be contained by any building, has always desired to be among his people and has therefore made a temple for Himself in his people.
This mystery is beautifully articulated by the Apostle Paul's letter to the Ephesians, where he writes you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of God's household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Jesus Christ Himself as the cornerstone. In Him, the whole building being put together grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In Him, you are also being built together for God's dwelling in the Spirit. Steven's speech will now dramatically change course. Instead of recounting lessons from Israel's history, he turns his focus squarely to the men before him.
It could be that Steven has made his point and was planning at this moment all along to reach his conclusion, or it could be that he could have gone on for some time, recounting more points from Israel's sordid history. But perhaps as Stephen looks out across the sea of faces, he sees nothing but contempt, and recognizing their impenetrable hardheartedness, he changes gears. Up to this point, Stephen has included himself in the address, using phrases like our Father, our ancestors, and our race. But in this moment, a distinction is made between those who receive Jesus as the Messiah and those who do not. And that's why Stephen will now switch to addressing them as you.
In doing this, Stephen represents Jesus and the Church, and things will never be the same again. The view that Christianity is a sect of Judaism or a harmless trend that will pass and fade away, can no longer be held. A line in the sand is being drawn here, and as a result, as we shall soon see, intense persecution of the Church is about to break out. The fermenting jealousy and hatred of the Jewish religious leaders toward Jesus and his followers is about to explode from a small flame into a raging fire. Write this down.
Verse 51 marks the dividing line between Christianity and all other belief systems. Here's the line Jesus is God and the only way to be saved from one's sins. Jesus is God and the only way to be saved from one's sins. That's the dividing line between true Christianity and everything else. Stephen looks at the Sanhedrin and says in verse 51, you stiff-necked people.
He concluded that he should build a glorious temple to house the Ark of the Covenant. David shared his desire with the prophet Nathan, who impulsively told David that it was a great idea, and that he should do everything that was in his heart. However, that night, God spoke to Nathan, and Nathan had to sheepishly go back the next day and tell David I spoke out of turn. I was impulsive, and I should have sought the Lord first. God says that he doesn't want you to build him a house because your hands are bloodied from war.
But God will build you a house, David, and establish your throne and your family line forever. God was speaking of the fact that Jesus the Messiah would come from the family line of David. And one day in the future, Jesus will indeed reign as king over the earth from the throne of David in Jerusalem at the time of the millennium. This is what the angel was speaking of when he first appeared to Mary and told her, you will conceive and give birth to a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High.
And the Lord God will give him the throne of his Father David. He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and his kingdom will have no end. Now, obviously, this incredible gesture by the Lord just blew David away. Nathan then went on to tell David that it would be his son Solomon who would build a house for the Lord. The first temple in Jerusalem.
Steven continues in verse 48 but the Most High underline this. The Most High does not dwell in Sanctuaries, made with hands, as the prophet says. And now Stephen quotes from Isaiah 66, Heaven is my throne and the earth my footstool. What sort of house will you build for me? Says the Lord, or what will be my resting place?
Did not my hand make all these things? Stephen points out that God permitted Solomon to build the temple as an answer to David's desire to honor the Lord. God didn't ask for a temple, and the idea that he could somehow be honored by a building is ridiculous, as he's the one who created everything that would be used in its construction. The God who makes universes and heavens and everything on the earth can make whatever he wants if there's anything that he wants. As far as a building or a house goes.
Stephen again masterfully quotes the scripture and says, Isaiah understood this. David understood this as well. He collected a special offering from the people of Israel to raise money and supplies for the temple that his Son would build. When the people responded with radical generosity, David's prayer included these statements but who am I and who are my people that we should be able to give as generously as this? For everything comes from you, and we have given you only what comes from your own hand.
Lord our God, all this wealth that we've provided for building you a house for your holy Name comes from your hand. Everything belongs to you. And when Solomon dedicated the Finnish temple, his prayer included this but will God indeed live on earth? Even heaven, the highest heaven, cannot contain you, much less this temple I have built. Steven's point is clear.
The Jews had elevated the importance of the temple to the level of idolatry, foolishly believing that God's work and presence were entirely contained within it and limited by it. They were accusing Stephen of blaspheming the temple. Stephen was accusing them of blaspheming God by limiting his power, presence, and work among his people to the confines of the temple, making the temple greater than God himself. The temple was a symbol of God's presence, not a prison for it. If God has a home on earth, it is among his people, for wherever they are, there he is too.
As we witness the final part of Stephen's address before the Sanhedrin, we learn what it looks like to follow Jesus in life and death.
In Acts chapter seven. We're going to pick things up in verse 44. We're going to get there in just a minute. But to set the scene. Stephen is on trial before the Sanhedrin, the Council of Jewish religious leaders in Jerusalem.
He is charged with blaspheming God, the law, Moses, and the temple. The latter charge carries the death penalty. In his defense, Stephen has been walking the Sanhedrin through certain aspects of Israel's history, drawing out undeniable and critical truths, such as God has never needed a holy temple, city, or land to meet with his people. Those who follow God cannot dictate how he fulfills his promises. Israel was founded on faith, Israel's rejection of God's deliverer.
Moses delayed her liberation from Egypt by 40 years. Israel's refusal to believe God's promises delayed her entry into the Promised Land by 40 years. Israel's ancestors loved Egypt more than the Promised Land. They loved pagan idols more than the living God. And most damnable of all, Israel's history reveals a pattern of rejecting the rulers and deliverers that God sends.
In response to the accusation that he had blasphemed the temple, Stephen now says a few words about the dwelling places of God. As I said, we'll pick things up. Acts chapter seven, verses 44. Our ancestors had the tabernacle of the testimony in the wilderness, just as he who spoke to Moses commanded him to make it according to the pattern he had seen. Our ancestors in turn received it, and Joshua brought it in when they dispossessed the nations that God drove out before them until the days of David.
This is your first villain, and then we'll unpack it. Stephen points out that when God commissioned a dwelling for his presence, he specified the Tabernacle. He specified the Tabernacle. God didn't ask for a temple because a portable dwelling for his presence fulfilled his desire to dwell among his people wherever he led them. A tabernacle allowed God's people to move with his presence and his presence to move with his people.
And indeed, that was the case throughout Israel's conquest of the Promised Land all the way up to the days of David. God commanded Israel to build Him a tabernacle, not a temple, because a tabernacle better reflected God's desired relationship with his people. Now, if you're a Bible nerd, you might want to underline the three words he had seen, because it's a little bit of a nugget if you're into that kind of thing. It tells us that not only did God give Moses the specifications for building the Tabernacle, but he also showed Moses what the Tabernacle would look like. And I know this isn't what happened, but in my head, I just imagined God speaking to Moses through the angels on top of Mount Sinai, and he's giving Moses the law and the specifications for the tabernacle.
And Moses is just looking at them and he's a bit confused. And then he just asks God, can you, like, draw me a picture. And God's like, fine, I'll just show you. And bam, he just shows him what it looks like. Steven now revisits how Israel got the temple.
Did God tell him to build it? Later, Stephen reminds the Sanhedrin verse 46 he that's David, he found favor in God's sight and asked that he might provide a dwelling place for the God of Jacob. It was Solomon, rather, who built him a house. David had wonderful intentions. After God had given him victory over his enemies, David found himself sitting in his splendorous palace, and he became vexed by the fact that the Ark of the Covenant, where God's presence dwelled, was currently living in a tent.
God loves you enough to let the bottom fall out of your life. If that's what it will take to get you to respond to Him, every option is on the table. If you're being stubborn in responding to God, my exhortation is real simple change, change. Repent. Respond to God.
Say yes to him. The thing that hit me so heavily as I was studying for this is that we don't have 40 years to waste. You don't have 40 years to waste wandering in the wilderness, being in bondage to sin, being controlled by your sin, enslaved to whatever your flesh desires. You don't have 40 years to waste. You don't have four years to waste.
Life is short. You might not even have four days to waste. Do not think that if God is speaking to you and you are saying no, you will hear his voice forever so that you can respond later at a time that's more convenient for you. He doesn't promise you that. Scripture says today is the day of salvation.
If you hear the word of the Lord today, do not harden your heart to respond today because you don't know that you'll hear it tomorrow. And if you keep saying no, you will wake up one day, you won't hear the voice of God and you won't be able to find the truth anymore. You won't be able to tell the difference between the light and the dark if you've never given your life to Jesus and he is calling you to do that today and you know it. Don't delay. There's no time to waste.
There's no time to waste. Come and talk to me or BJ after the service. We're not going to embarrass you. We're just going to have a conversation on the side and talk through how you can begin this relationship with God. If you need to repent, do that.
Do that. If you need to take a step of faith and you've been putting it off because it's hard, it's difficult, it requires sacrifice, do it. Obey the voice of God while you can hear it.
I'll take my sin. That's what Jesus said. And Stephen just keeps hitting the nail on the head over and over. And now he brings up the infamous golden calf incident from Exodus 32. In verse 40, they Israel told Aaron, make us gods who will go before us.
As for this Moses who brought us out of the land of Egypt, we don't know what's happened to him. They even made a calf in those days, offered sacrifice to the idol, and were celebrating what their hands had made. Stephen reminds the Sanhedrin. Oh. Our sacred ancestors.
Let's just revisit history a little bit. Literally. While Moses is being given the Law. Literally, while he's up on the top of Mount Sinai. And the whole mountain is enveloped in thick smoke with the presence of God.
While they can see that Israel is at the bottom of the mountain saying. I don't know if Moses is coming back down. Aaron, you're in charge. Make us a golden calf idol so we can have an orgy and worship that. Let's do that.
Steven said, do you understand this? Moses is on the mountain hearing from God at that moment, and they're already rebelling and turning away so they can see God. There is the smoke of His presence, and they're already rejecting Him in favor of idols because they turned their hearts back to Egypt already. The arrival of the Law certainly didn't make Israel righteous. And now Stephen describes what happened to Israel between the time they conquered the promised land and the time when they were taken away centuries later in the Babylonian exile, verse 42, god turned away and gave them up.
You see, when a person receives revelation from God, he lets them understand that he's real. He reveals to their innermost spirit something of himself. When a person receives that, has that, can see that, but still rejects it because they would rather keep their sin, scripture says God will ultimately let them have their way. He won't overpower them. He'll actually stop revealing the truth to them and say, okay, I won't reveal myself to you anymore.
I won't let you see the truth anymore. I'll actually give your mind over to the sin that you love. So that the sin that you're committing that you know is wrong. I'll actually give you a mind that will start to believe it's right. That's a judgment of God on people who persistently reject Him.
It's terrifying. It's terrifying, and it's why it's so urgent that we repent and turn to God when we recognize our sin, when he's speaking to us, we have to respond then because the Bible doesn't say that will go on forever. God does this today, and he did it to Israel thousands of years ago. God said, you've seen me, you've seen signs and wonders, and you still want to reject me. Okay, I'll give you a mind that will do that.
Paul describes this process in Romans chapter one. If you have your Bible and want to turn there, I'm just going to read through it. We don't have time to expose it at all. But in Romans one, beginning in verses 21, I'll read it to you. This is what God says happens to people even today.
And here's what's mind blowing just as I read this. Think about the world around us today and what you're seeing in culture, and then understand that the Apostle Paul was writing this almost 20 years ago about what was happening in culture then, and it was true a couple of thousand years before that, with Israel as well. Let me read it to you. Paul says that though they knew God, they did not glorify him as God or show gratitude. Instead, their thinking became worthless and their senseless hearts were darkened.
He commanded you to listen to him. He told you he was coming. He told you he would speak in God's name. But like your forefathers, you refuse to listen. Verse 38 he, Moses, is the one who was in the assembly underlying assembly in the wilderness with the angel, underlying the angel who spoke to him on Mount Sinai and with our ancestors.
He received living underlying living oracles. To give us all of that is a reference to the time that Moses was given the Law, and the Ten Commandments by God to give to the people of Israel. Stephen is pleading not guilty to the charge of blaspheming the Law. He affirms that he believes the Law was authored by God and given to Moses by angels, which is exactly what the Sanhedrin believed. Stephen is very intentionally referring to the Law as a living oracle to make the point that the word of God is living, it is alive and still being actively fulfilled.
The Sanhedrin were treating the Scriptures as though they were closed dead documents when they would have their eyes open and been looking for the fulfillment of God's promises, specifically the coveting of the Messiah. The word assembly in Greek is the word ekklesia, which you may know is used to describe the collective church body throughout the New Testament. There's a link being made here. You see, at Mount Sinai, the Law came down from God, and he made a people for Himself who were to be marked by their obedience to His Word. In Jesus, God came down and gave us Himself to make a new people for Himself who are marked by his spirit, his.
Presence dwells within them, leading them to obey His Word. Through Jesus, God has once again gathered a people for Himself, and this time, because they have his spirit, they will not collectively turn away from Him. When you see the phrase the angel in the Old Testament, that's always a reference to the one also sometimes called the angel of the Lord. In other verses, who is it? It's the pre-incarnate Jesus appearing to somebody.
So not only is the church, the new people that God has gathered for Himself and marked with his spirit, but the same angel who spoke with Moses on Mount Sinai and was there at the burning bush has come to the earth and spoken to us as Jesus of Nazareth. Verse 39. Our ancestors were underlying unwilling to obey Him. They were unwilling to obey Moses. Instead, they pushed him aside underline that, and then this is huge.
And in their hearts, they turned back to Egypt. Despite all the miracles, all the signs and wonders, and despite giving the people the law from God, Israel still refused to obey Moses. They turned their hearts back to Egypt. And in the Bible, Egypt is a picture of the world, the world system that has nothing to do with God. It's the antithesis of the kingdom of God.
Steven is saying at the end of the day, they love their sin more than God. They love their sin more than they love the deliverer God sent them. And if you want to talk about the Holy Land, just remember this, write this down, Israel's ancestors loved Egypt more than they loved the Promised Land. They had to be dragged into the Promised Land, kicking and screaming in their hearts. They just wanted to go back.
They loved their sin. This is what Jesus told Nicodemus in John chapter three, when he said, this is the judgment. The light has come into the world. And people love darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light and avoids it so that his deeds may not be exposed.
It's not about evidence. It's not about signs and wonders. It's not because of anything lacking on God's part that people reject God. It's because at the end of the day, underneath it all, they love their sin more than they love God, and they don't want to give it up. You can have your sin or you can have God.
What have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt? Isn't this what we told you in Egypt? Leave us alone so that we may serve the Egyptians. It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness. You know the story.
God moves miraculously, and Moses leads Israel through the reed seed to safety, which miraculously parts, and then closes in on the pursuing Egyptian army. And yet a short time later, the people are complaining and grumbling again. Stephen intentionally references that period of 40 years again, the length of time Israel wandered in the wilderness instead of going directly to the Promised Land. Now, why does Stephen do that? Because of the reason Israel wandered in the wilderness for 40 years.
You see, when Israel reached the border of the Promised Land, coming out of Egypt from slavery, they came to the Jordan River, and Moses sent twelve spies across the Jordan River into the Promised Land to spy out the land, the people living in it, the food available, the fortifications. Those spies were gone for 40 days. And when they came back, ten of the spies said, it's an amazing land flowing with milk and honey, but there are giants in the land and they are going to eat us up. Only Caleb and Joshua said it is irrelevant if everyone in the land is a giant. God is with us.
That's all that matters. The people of Israel listened to the negative report of the ten spies and refused to cross the Jordan. They refused to trust God to keep his coveting and promises. They rejected God, they rejected Moses, and they rejected Joshua, who God had ordained to be their next deliverer. They rejected Joshua before he could even take the mantle of their next deliverer.
Consequently, God sentenced them to wonder in the wilderness for 40 years before they would get to try going into the Promised Land again. One year for every day the spies were in the Promised Land, and enough time for all the adults who were part of that faithless generation to die out. Steven's point was that just as Israel would, he been out of Egypt 40 years earlier, Israel could have been in the Promised Land 40 years earlier. The only reason she wasn't was because she refused to trust God and believe the deliverers that God sent her. Write this down Israel's refusal to believe God's promises delayed her entry into the Promised Land by 40 years.
It delayed her entry into the Promised Land by 40 years. In the same way. By rejecting Jesus, the Sanhedrin was condemning Israel to remain in bondage and aimless wandering. Verse 37. This is the Moses who said to the Israelites, God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your brothers.
Stephen is referencing Exodus 18, where God gave Moses a prophetic promise about Jesus the Messiah to share with Israel. Let me read a couple of verses to you from Exodus 18. This is what Moses told the people. He said, The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your own brothers. You must listen to him.
God says I, God will raise up for them a prophet like you, Moses, from among their brothers. I will put my words in his mouth, and he will tell them everything. I command them. I will hold accountable whoever does not listen to my words that he speaks in my name. When Jesus fed the 50, John tells us the crowd said, this truly is the prophet who is to come into the world.
They knew. They connected the dots. The regular people were recognizing this one who's feeding us miraculously. He's the prophet Moses was speaking about. Stephen is telling the Sanhedrin, god promised to raise up a prophet like Moses from among the people of Israel.
As he was approaching to look at it, the voice of the Lord came. I am the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob. This was God announcing that whatever he was about to speak to Moses was part of his grand covenant plan that traced its roots through Jacob, back to Isaac and all the way back to Abraham. Moses began to tremble and did not dare to look. The Lord said to him, take off the sandals from your feet now underline this, because the place where you are standing is holy ground.
The ground in Midian, outside the borders of the Promised Land, was made wholly by the presence of the Holy One, God himself. Any place inhabited by the presence of God becomes holy. And Stephen understood that God's presence was no longer restricted to only the temple or only within certain geographical borders. God's presence now resided in every man, woman, and child who placed their faith in Jesus. Because of God's Spirit, his presence now resided in people.
He had made them holy. As the 18th-century poet and hymn writer William Cowper put it, "Jesus, wherever thy people meet, there they behold thy mercy seat. Wherever they seek thee, thou art found, and every place is hallowed ground." God continued speaking to Moses and said in verse 34, "I have certainly seen the oppression of my people in Egypt. I have heard their groaning..." and then underline this, "...and have come down to set them free. And now come, I will send you to Egypt." God heard the cries of his people, sent them a deliverer, and through that deliverer came down to set his people free. This was, of course, what God had done to an ultimate degree. Through Jesus, he has seen his people in bondage to sin and death. He has heard their cries, and so he has sent a deliverer, Jesus Messiah, to set his people free.
And just in case the men of the Sanhedrin weren't connecting the dots, Stephen does it for them. In verse 35, "This Moses whom they rejected when they said, 'Who appointed you a ruler and a judge?' This one..." Underline this, ..." God sent as a ruler and a deliverer through..." And then underline this, "...the angel who appeared to him in the bush."
Stephen's point is that this is the pattern of Israel's history. They reject the deliverers that God sends to them. Make a note of this on your outlines. Israel's history reveals a pattern of rejecting the rulers and deliverers God sends to this day. There are rabbis who argue Jesus of Nazareth could not have been the Messiah, because if he were, Israel would have recognized Him almost 2000 years ago.
Stephen addressed the subjection by pointing out to the Sanhedrin that Israel had rejected both Joseph and Moses, who were only a small part of Israel's well-established pattern of rejecting God's chosen messengers. If you want to dig into this more on your own, we just don't have time today. I recommend looking into Jesus' parable of the vineyard owner in Matthew 21- 33 to 46. I put that reference on your outlines. Pick it up in verse 36.
This man Moses led them out and performed wonders and signs in the land of Egypt, at the Red Sea, in the wilderness for 40 years. Underlying 40 years, Israel rejected Moses the first time, and it cost them 40 more years of slavery in Egypt. They followed Him the second time only after he worked multiple signs and wonders, which were the famous plagues of Egypt. Do you see the parallels with Jesus here? Like Joseph, Israel accepted Moses only the second time he appeared to them.
So it will be with Jesus at the second coming after the signs and wonders of the Tribulation, Israel will accept Jesus as her deliverer. Israel's stubbornness comes to the fore again. Soon after they start following Moses. When it looked like they were pinned against the reed sea, exodus tells us they said to him, and this is on your outlines. Is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you've taken us away to die in the wilderness?
Verse 23 when he was 40 years would, he decided to visit his own people, the Israelites. Again, God had determined that when Moses was 40 years old, it was time for the next step. Moses knew that he was a Hebrew. It wasn't a secret. And he knew somehow that God had called him to deliver his people.
Believing and sensing that the time had come for Moses to reveal himself to them and take charge and lead them to freedom, he went to go and see them. It says when he saw one of them being mistreated, he came to his rescue and avenged the oppressed man by striking down the Egyptian. Moses comes across an Egyptian man physically abusing a Hebrew man, and he acts. And in that conflict, Moses ends up killing the Egyptian man. Verses 25 he assumed his people would understand that God would give them deliverance through him, but underline this they did not understand.
When Moses came upon this Egyptian man abusing a Hebrew, he must have thought, wow, God is orchestrating this. I'm going to save this man, and this will be my introduction to my people. Their first interaction with me will be as a deliverer. What an entrance. But as Stephen points out, they did not understand.
They did not recognize him or receive him as their deliverer. The next day he showed up while they were fighting and tried to reconcile them peacefully, saying, Men, you are brothers. Why are you mistreating each other? Moses comes back the next day, finds the Hebrew men fighting among themselves, and tries to play the role of peacemaker. Note their response in verse 27.
But the one who was mistreating his neighbor pushed Moses aside, saying, who appointed you a ruler and a judge over us? Do you want to kill me the same way you killed the Egyptian yesterday? The Hebrews responded as the wicked men in Jesus' parable of the ten miners in Luke 19 did, saying, we don't want this man to rule over us. They responded as the chief priests who were sitting before Stephen had responded to Pilate just months earlier at the trial of Jesus, shouting, we have no king but Caesar. The Israelites asked Moses who died and made you Pharaoh?
If we don't follow you, are you just going to kill me like you killed that Egyptian yesterday? Yeah. We all know verse 29. When he heard this, Moses fled and became an exile in the land of Midian, where he became the father of two sons. After 40 years had passed - underline 40 years - Moses now knew that not only were his people rejecting him, but they were going to snitch on him.
He would have been charged with murder, a capital offense in Egypt at the time. Not only that, Pharaoh would have surmised that he was initiating a Hebrew insurrectionist movement, a rebellion. So, Moses felt he had no choice but to flee. Stephen is making the point that Israel's rejection of God's chosen messenger, his chosen deliverer Moses - get this - because they rejected Moses, it delayed Israel's deliverance from Egypt by 40 years. 40 years.
And the question Stephen is asking the Sanhedrin under all of this is, are you going to make the same mistake? Are you going to remain in spiritual bondage and slavery because you refuse to welcome and receive and recognize God's chosen deliverer for you? Jesus of Nazareth, write this down Israel's rejection of God's deliverer Moses delayed her liberation by 40 years. It delayed her liberation by 40 years.
As a side note, just for you Bible nerds, it was only Israel's rejection of her deliverer, Moses, that caused him to leave the place where Israel was and take a Gentile bride. The typology of the church is obvious if you want to dig into that. Verse 30. After 40 years had passed, an angel appeared to him in the wilderness of Mount Sinai in the flame of a burning bush. When Moses saw it, he was amazed at the sight.
I like it here. Stephen doesn't mention this, but it's another example of Israel's collective pattern of stubbornness. Things had to get so bad in Egypt before they would even consider leaving. And even when they did, it didn't take very long before they were saying, maybe we should go back. God made promises in his word that Israel would become a political nation and dwell in the Promised Land again after they were scattered.
But after that happened, between 70 Ad and 120 Ad in the Diaspora, the land of Israel remained empty for most of 1900 years. Why? Largely because the Jewish people prospered in other places and only moved on to other places. When persecution got bad enough where they were, they weren't interested in returning to the Promised Land and faith. What did it take to get the Jewish people to return to the Land of Israel?
Do you know what it took? The Holocaust. Literally. Look up the history. It took the Holocaust to get them to come back into the land so that God's promises could be fulfilled.
Now, knowing that what do you think it will take to get Israel to accept Jesus as her Messiah? The answer, the tribulation. Scripture says two out of three of all Jews on earth dying in the Tribulation is what it will take to get Israel to the point where they're ready to welcome Jesus at the Second Coming. That's what it will take to break them. Verse 19.
The Pharaoh dealt deceitfully with our race and oppressed our ancestors by making them abandon their infants outside so that they wouldn't survive to try and control this explosive population growth among the Hebrews in Egypt, the Pharaoh enslaved them and demanded that all midwives who delivered babies immediately take them and leave them outside exposed to animals and the elements until they died. Verse 20. At this time Moses was born, at this time, the appointed time, and he was beautiful in God's sight. He was cared for in his father's home for three months. God had a plan and was preparing his chosen deliverer for his people, Moses.
And again, if you know the story, the Hebrew midwives didn't obey Pharaoh. They flat out disobeyed him. They refused to kill the baby boys. Stephen summarizes Moses upbringing and intentionally describes him as beautiful in God's sight to show the Sanhedrin that he, Stephen, reveres Moses, contrary to the charge that he has spoken blasphemies against him. When Pharaoh learned that the midwives were disobeying him, he gave a new command to his soldiers and people to simply go and grab and seize every Hebrew baby, infant, and small child who was male, and throw them in the Nile River to be drowned.
But God had a plan to preserve Moses life. It says when he was put outside, the pharaoh's daughter adopted and raised him as her own son. Knowing that soldiers would soon visit their house, Moses parents, in desperation, not knowing what else to do, put him in a basket floated him down the river, and said, God do a miracle. And God did. Through a miraculous series of events, Moses ends up being found by the daughter of Pharaoh, who adopts him as a baby and raises him as her own in the palace of Pharaoh.
So, Moses was educated in all the wisdom of the Egyptians and was powerful in his speech and actions. Moses was raised by the best teachers, the greatest scholars in the most advanced civilization in the world at the time Egypt. He was a natural leader, gifted by God, and highly educated. He was schooled, sparing no expense in all the customs of the land. Stephen once again shows his respect for Moses by describing him as powerful in speech and actions, a description the Sanhedrin knew full well also applied to Jesus of Nazareth, who was described by the travelers on the road to Emmaus as a prophet, powerful in action and speech before God and all the people.
They will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and weep bitterly for him as one weeps for a firstborn. And then Zechariah also says, on that day, a fountain will be opened for the house of David and for the residents of Jerusalem to wash away sin and impurity. Just as Joseph's brothers repented and wept over their sin toward their brother, Israel will do the same over Jesus on the day that he is revealed as their Messiah. I don't think Stephen had this in mind when he was saying this. I think he hoped that he and the apostles were the second visitation to the Sanhedrin and the Jewish people.
But that second visitation will be Jesus himself picking things up. Halfway through verse 15, he and our ancestors, Joseph and our ancestors died there in Egypt, were carried back to Sheckham and were placed in the tomb that Abraham had bought for a sum of silver from the sons of Hamor and Shekham. Where were the first generation of the sons of Israel sustained, blessed, and prospered by God in Egypt? Not Israel. When their bodies were buried in Shechem, it was still Samaritan-owned territory there.
Being buried there was actually an act of faith that God would fulfill his covenant and give the Promised Land to people from the tribe of Israel one day in the future. This is Stephen again, highlighting the fact that Israel was founded on faith in God. Before they had the law, before they had a temple, before they had a holy city, before they had a holy land, the patriarchs died with their faith in God, and Stephen now shifts his focus to a great man in Israel's history whose memory and name he had been accused of blasphemy. A man who like Stephen was also a picture of Jesus, Moses. In verse 17, he says, as the time was approaching to fulfill the promise that God had made to Abraham, the promise that he would give Abraham's family line the Promised Land.
Stephen points out that God always has a plan. He always has a specific time when he will fulfill every promise he has made. Just as God appointed Joseph to be the prime minister of Egypt, so that he was there at a specific time, just as God appointed Moses to be there at a specific time, he has sent Jesus for a specific time. He says the people flourished and multiplied. Here we see it in Egypt.
Israel grew from 75 people to an estimated couple of million people in Egypt, the people of God, Israel, flourished and multiplied in Egypt. Again, God's work among his people was not limited or restricted to a temple, a city, or a specific location. Then, he says, until a different king who did not know Joseph ruled over Egypt. And Steven will now talk about how God orchestrated events in Egypt to accomplish his purposes for his people. And if you're familiar with the Exodus account, you'll know that this specific pharaoh woke up one day and became alarmed by the fact that the Hebrews were flourishing and multiplying.
He looked at them and said, these guys are going to take over Egypt. There's too many of them. If you studied the story of Israel across the Old Testament, or maybe you're doing it now with us in home groups, you'll understand. I thought about this for the first time this week. If God had not raised up this wicked Pharaoh to enslave Israel, they would never have left Egypt, ever.
Israel would not have cared enough about God's promise of a Promised Land to leave their comfort and prosperity in Egypt. We see this at the end of the Babylonian exile, when only a small fraction of the Israelis choose to leave Babylon and return to the Promised Land. Even when the king offers the money to rebuild Jerusalem. Most of them just stay in Babylon. They're like, we're good.
It says, but God was with him. God was with Joseph and rescued him out of all of his troubles. He gave him favor and wisdom in the sight of Pharaoh, King of Egypt, who appointed him ruler over Egypt and over his whole household. Stephen repeats a point we mentioned in our previous study. The fact that God was with Joseph and blessed Joseph in Egypt proves again that God has never needed a holy temple, city, or land to meet with his people.
Joseph's story in the Book of Genesis reveals that Joseph was a type. He was a prophetic picture of Jesus. In the Old Testament, there are these men whose lives are called types, as in a word like prototype or archetype. They were real men who lived, and the things written about them in the Bible are true. But God orchestrated events so that certain aspects of their life created a prophetic picture that would point ahead to the ministry of Jesus sometimes thousands of years later.
Joseph is one of these types of Jesus. Joseph was given authority over all that belonged to Pharaoh. Other than Pharaoh, Joseph was the mightiest man in Egypt, with more power than anyone else. The Heavenly Father has given Jesus authority over all things. Paul writes in Philippians 2 and it's on your outlines.
God highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. And Stephen continues in verse 11 now a famine and great suffering came over all of Egypt and Canaan, and our ancestors could find no food. Steven makes a point here that I think is unintentional. I think it's the Lord speaking through him, even though he's not fully aware of it. As I mentioned earlier, the patriarch's rejection of Joseph was the first of what would become a pattern of Israel rejecting the messengers that God sent to her, and it was followed by a season of literal famine.
Similarly, Israel's rejection of Jesus plunged them into a spiritual famine that will last until the day when Paul writes, and then all Israel will be saved. For you see, like Joseph, Jesus has been empowered and positioned to save the very people who sought to arrange his demise. Says in verse 12, when Jacob heard there was grain in Egypt, he sent our ancestors there the first time underlying the first time, now underlying the first. Three words of verse 13 the second time Joseph revealed himself to his brothers and Joseph's family became known to Pharaoh. Joseph invited his father Jacob and all his relatives, 75 people in all, and Jacob went down to Egypt.
If you've studied the Exodus story, you know that incredible scene where it's revealed that the most powerful man in Egypt is their brother. Not only is he alive, but he's the prime minister of Egypt and will use his position to save them and bring them into the kingdom of Egypt and prosper them all. Now, in the same way, Israel will not recognize who Jesus truly is until his Second Coming. When that time comes, Jesus will be revealed as the Savior of Israel, and the relationship will be restored, just as Joseph's relationship with his brothers was restored. So write this down.
It's your first fill-in. Israel only received Joseph and Moses the second time they came to them, so it shall be with Jesus, Israel's Messiah, at the Second Coming. At the Second Coming. Like the apostle Paul in Romans 11, the prophet Zechariah foretells of this day in chapters 12 and 13 of his book prophesying from the perspective of Jesus. Then I will pour out a spirit of grace and prayer on the house of David and the residence of Jerusalem, and they will look at me, whom they pierced.
Series: Acts,,,Passage: Acts 7:9-43 Speaker: Jeff Thompson
Stephen continues his address to the Sanhedrin, highlighting Israel’s tragic history of rejecting God’s messengers and wasting opportunities to be delivered from slavery, exile, and aimless wandering
Last week we focused on Steven, a man described as full of faith and the Holy Spirit, full of wisdom, and full of grace and power. In fact, we were told that Stephen was performing great wonders and signs among the people. And the original Greek of that text told us this was happening on a continual basis. In other words, in the early days of the church in Jerusalem, around 32 Ad. Stephen was healing the sick and performing miracles on a similar level to that of the apostles.
He got into one or more debates with some men from local synagogues. Steven's arguments were all rooted in the Old Testament scriptures and inspired by the Holy Spirit, which is why we read that Stephen's opponents were unable to stand up against his wisdom and the spirit by whom he was speaking. Instead of recognizing the truth and responding to the gospel that Stephen was preaching, these men hardened their hearts, arranged false witnesses, brought charges against Stephen, and dragged him before the Sanhedrin, the ruling council of Jewish religious leaders in Jerusalem at the time. Specifically, they charged Stephen with speaking blasphemies against Moses, the Law, the Temple, and God himself. The reason for these charges is that the Jewish religious leaders known collectively as the Sanhedrin had been given power by their Roman overlords to try and punish only one specific type of crime, attacks against the temple in word or deed.
All other crimes had to go through Roman prefects who were overseeing the province of Judea at the time. So they charged Steven with the one crime they knew they could execute themselves for blasphemy against the temple. Today we're going to pick things up where we left off last week. We're right in the middle of Stephen's address to the Sanhedrin. In response to these charges, every sentence that Stephen speaks is loaded with meaning and subtext that the Sanhedrin would have understood.
And as we study our way through this, I'll do my best to just bring out that subtext and that hidden meaning behind the text. As we make our way through this, we're going to pick things up. In Acts chapter seven, verses nine, Stephen will now focus on a few specifics from the life of Joseph. He says the patriarchs became jealous, underline jealous. They became jealous of Joseph and sold him into Egypt.
If you're familiar with that story, Steven is referring to the brothers of Joseph, but he called them here the patriarchs. The patriarchs were the twelve sons of Jacob who became the twelve tribes of Israel. They were called the patriarchs because they were and are viewed as the fathers of the twelve tribes of Israel. Steven reminds the Sanhedrin that their venerated patriarchs became jealous of their brother Joseph, the most righteous and Godly among them, and sold him to passing slave traders who then sold Joseph in Egypt, the mightiest empire in the world at the time. The heir would have been thick with tension.
As Stephen pointed out Israel's pattern of rejecting God's chosen messengers began with the patriarchs, the fathers of the nation of Israel. The inference was that the Sanhedrin was walking in the same pattern as the patriarchs by hating their brother Jesus of Nazareth without cause because they were jealous of him, and their jealousy rendered them spiritually blind. And sadly. There are three times in the Book of Acts where we'll see the Jewish religious leaders become jealous when the crowds come to the apostles to hear the Gospel and be healed. Let's keep reading.
Make a note of this. Like Abraham. God has marked us as his people. Scripture says that he circumcised our hearts by putting His Spirit within us. We're not like the rest of the world.
And one of the most underrated benefits of having the Holy Spirit within us is that he is available. He's available as often as we need to remind us of who we belong to and man, we need to be reminded of that we're sons and daughters of the living God, the God of heaven and earth, who's high above all things. Did you know that you can just ask God to do that at any moment? Just to remind you who you are in Christ, just to remind you who you are. And he will.
He will. Anywhere, anytime. The Holy Spirit marks us as the people of God. I'm going to ask the worship team to come up as I get ready to close. These are all simple truths, but they are profound truths.
Imagine if Abraham had said no one time that God called him to relocate. Imagine if he had said, I really like it here. I've got a nice place. I'm getting on with my neighbors. Business is doing well.I'm just not at that stage of life. God, where a move is good right now, kind of in kickback gear, I've hit the peak of my career and this is my time to just enjoy myself. Can I tell you a secret?
There's never going to be a stage of life where faith doesn't require faith. If you ever find yourself in that situation, it simply means you've stopped living and walking by faith. Obey God today. Whatever it looks like, whatever it costs, whatever stage of life you're in, whatever circumstance you're in, obey God today and then obey God tomorrow, whatever it looks like, whatever it costs you. And keep doing that until you wake up one day in the presence of Jesus, which you will because when that day comes, you will realize that you lived wisely and profitably because you lived your whole life by faith, and you lived for the only thing that actually matters the glory of Jesus.
Peter wrote this in his first Epistle. It's on your outlines. Take this to heart. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who according to his abundant mercy. Has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you who are kept by the power of God through faith for salvation ready to be revealed in the last days. In this, you greatly rejoice, though now, for a little while, if need be. You've been grieved by various trials that the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ, who having not seen you love, though now you do not see Him, yet believing you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, receiving the end of your faith, the salvation of your souls.
We do not labor in vain, Church. We do not labor in vain. Keep your head up, keep your eyes on Jesus. Keep the faith, stay on the narrow path.
Take up your cross daily and follow Jesus, because what no eye has seen, no ear has heard, and no human heart has conceived, god has prepared these things for those who love Him.
Like Abraham, we have been given a promise that we will not see fulfilled during our earthly lives, and we have been called to follow God toward it by faith. The apostle Peter urged the brethren to remember to live their lives as sojourners and pilgrims. Paul reminded the Philippians that our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to his glorious body. And Jesus told Thomas, because you have seen me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and have yet believed.
Jesus is talking about you and me, and today he would say to you, blessed are you who have not seen and yet have believed. John wrote to the brethren, behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us that we should be called children of God. Therefore, the world does not know us because it did not know him. Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be. But we know that when it is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as he is.
If you ever feel out of place in this world, it's because you are. You are out of place in this world. You belong with Jesus. You are a sojourner in this life, a pilgrim. And as we journey toward Jesus, it is our job as his ambassadors to tell as many people as possible where we're going, how we're going to get there, how wonderful Jesus is, and most of all, how much he wants them to come to we're people of the promise.
Just like Abraham. Write this down like Abraham, we must be ready to follow the Lord wherever he leads us. We must be ready to follow the Lord wherever he leads us. Unlike Abraham, we must not dictate to the Lord the manner in which he fulfills his promises to us. We should be careful to not be like the Sanhedrin who determined that God's promised Messiah had to facilitate the continuation of temple rituals and the law and restore the nation of Israel to political prominence.
They put conditions on the way that God was to fulfill his promise, and we should be careful not to do the same and assume things like God's plans for my life can be whatever he wants as long as they include a comfortable middle or upper middle-class lifestyle. God's plans for my life are limitless as long as they take place in the city where I live right now, because I really like it here. God's plans. For my life must include the exact number of children that I find most convenient. Not less, not more.
God needs to keep his hands off that. God's plans for my life must include me getting married around this specific age can't be younger, can't be older. God's plans for my life can be whatever he decides, as long as they take place in my preferred career path. God's plans for my life must include the absence of health problems. I'm not open to that.
For God's plans for my life must include no tragedies. And on and on and on. I could go the follower of Jesus, pray your will be done, your will be done, and then remain open to however the Lord chooses to accomplish his will. That's his business. And the follower of Jesus knows that however the Lord chooses to accomplish his will, it will require faith and action.
God is able to accomplish his will. Even when you're in Egypt, even when things look hopeless, even when days are dark, the plans of God are not limited by your location or your circumstances, or your financial situation, your relational situation, or your health situation.
When Israel spent all those years in slavery in Egypt, out of the Promised Land, was God's plan limited? Was it derailed? Was it delayed? On the contrary, it was in Egypt, in slavery, that the nation of Israel grew and exploded in number exponentially. The plans of God are not limited by location or anything else.
There is nothing that ever comes up that can derail the plans of God. Nothing. He is able to work wonders and accomplish his plans however he chooses. Steven points out that Abraham never even owned a foot of land in the Promised Land. He never had a tangible object in which to place his faith, like a temple, a city, or a piece of land he owned.
All he had to go on was the word of God, and that was enough. And that's why Abraham goes down in history as the father of faith. Genesis 15:6 tells us, Abram believed the Lord, and God credited it to him as righteousness. Abraham didn't have the law, he didn't have the land of Israel, he didn't have the city of Jerusalem, and he didn't have the temple, but he believed in the promises of God, and because he did, God judged him righteous. The implication is that the Sanhedrin had placed their faith not in God or his promises, but in the Law, the temple, the city of Jerusalem, and the land of Israel.
Stephen's point is that Israel was founded on faith. The only sign given to Abraham was circumcision, a physical mark of God's covenant, marking him and those in his line as the people of God. And even this Abraham did by faith, without the law, without a temple, without a holy city or country. Abraham met with God, was directed by God, was given promises by God, obeyed God, and pleased God. True worship of God, Steven was arguing, has always been about a holy God making for Himself a holy people.
And to do that, he requires only faith and obedience. Now, for the final part of the message I said final part, not final minutes. For the final part, I want to look at some things that we can take from Stephen's words, encouragement, exhortation, and reminders. Firstly, write this down. Like Abraham, we are able to fellowship with God anywhere.
We're able to fellowship with God anywhere. We don't need a priest, a temple, or a holy location. God has made all who have placed their faith in Jesus into temples of the Spirit of God, his very presence. I know you know this, but I pray that it astounds you one more time. As you hear it, wherever you go, the presence of God goes with you because he is in you.
In One Timothy Two, Paul writes, that there's one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all. Our access to God is through Jesus anytime, anywhere. Probably my favorite verse in the whole Bible, Hebrews 4/15 and 16 it's on your outline declares, we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in every way as we are, yet without sin. Therefore, let us approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in time of need. As a side note, I trust everyone here is mature enough to not respond to the reality that we can fellowship with God anywhere by thinking, great, I don't need to come to church anymore.
Then you need to be involved in the church's life because Jesus wants his people to fellowship with Him and one another. And you cannot do the one without one another, and he desires his church to serve and worship Him both individually and collectively. That is the will of Jesus. And anyone who says, I'm going to follow Jesus without being involved with his people is not in the will of God.
He didn't give him an inheritance in it, not even a foot of ground, but he promised to give it to him as a possession and to his descendants after him, even though he was childless. God spoke in this way. His descendants would be strangers in a foreign country, and they would enslave and oppress them for 400 years. That's speaking, of course, of Israel's slavery in Egypt. I will judge the nation that they serve as slaves.
God said, after this, they will come out and worship me in this place. And so he gave Abraham the covenant of circumcision. After this, he fathered Isaac and circumcised him. On the 8th day, Isaac became the father of Jacob, and Jacob became the father of the Twelve Patriarchs. Stephen points out that God introduced himself to the father of Israel and Judaism, Abraham, and fellowshipped with him outside of the holy city of Jerusalem and outside even the holy land of Israel.
In fact, he met with Abraham in Haran, a pagan Mesopotamian city noted for its worship of the moon. So write this down. Stevens's first point is that God has never needed a holy temple, city, or land to meet with his people. God has never needed a holy temple, city, or land to meet with his people. Stephen's second point is that Abraham lived by faith in promises given to him by God.
Abraham had to be willing to change his plans whenever God revealed the next step. He had to literally move to stay in the will and plan of God. In the famous hall of Faith of Hebrews Eleven, we read this about Abraham. It's on your outlines. By faith, Abraham, when he was called, obeyed and set out for a place that he was going to receive as an inheritance.
He went out even though he did not know where he was. Going by faith. He stayed as a foreigner in the land of Promise, living in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, coheirs of the same promise, for he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose architect and builder is God. Steve's next point is that God gives his people promises. That necessitates faith, action, and a willingness to follow wherever he leads.
And here's the connection to the Sanhedrin and the Jews who rejected Jesus. God had given Israel the promise that he would send her a Messiah. Israel had faith in that promise. However, they were unwilling to accept Jesus as Messiah because he didn't meet their fleshly expectations. They wanted a militant messiah who would overthrow the Romans.
Abraham had faith even when the next step didn't make sense to him. He went out when God told him to go, even when he didn't know where he was going. He trusted God to provide a child, even though he and Sarah were impossibly old. The Father of Israel lived by faith and followed God wherever he was led. The glory of God appeared to Abraham, and so he followed.
The glory of God appeared to Israel in the man Christ Jesus. But Israel said we will not follow. We will not have this man rule over us. Abraham encountered God in such a way that he was compelled to follow and obey him. Jesus told his disciples, the one who has seen me has seen the Father.
But Israel refused to follow and obey Jesus. Write this down. This is Stephen's next point. Those who follow God cannot dictate how he fulfills his promises. The promised Messiah showed up, and Israel said, we have terms and conditions. Though the Messiah must overthrow the Romans, those who follow God don't get to tell him how he ought to fulfill his promises. The Sanhedrin had added to the Scriptures by insisting that any fulfillment of God's messianic promises had to include the continuation of temple rituals, it had to include the continuation of the Law, and it had to include the political prosperity of the nation of Israel. But the Lord had other plans, plans that were tragically unacceptable to the Sanhedrin.
And all who were sitting in the Sanhedrin looked intently at him, at Stephen, and saw that - underline this - his face was like the face of an angel. If you want to understand the kind of man that Stephen was, or more importantly, if you want to understand how God viewed Stephen, consider that God only did something like this for one other man in history - Moses' face, you will recall, glowed with God's glory after he had fellowship with him. Stephen was marked by God as one of the greatest men who ever lived. God was saying that he was a man on the level of Moses.
The Sanhedrin would obviously be familiar with the story of Moses and his shining face, and they would have understood the significance of Stephen's visage. It was God authenticating Stephen as his representative. This was God saying, this man has been with me, this man represents me, and this man speaks the truth about me. The Sanhedrin had known the Spirit of God was on Jesus and they knew the Spirit of God was on Stephen. They could see it on his face.
Steven's Gloriously anointed face reminds me of a Spurgeon quote which isn't totally connected but was just so good. I had to just throw it in here because it's one of my favorites. He was talking one time, it is said, to a group of students who aspire to a life of vocational ministry. And he told the men, "When you teach on Heaven, let there always be a glow on your face, a gleam in your eye, and a smile on your lips. When you teach on hell, your normal face will do fine."
That's a good quote, right? So, with the charges laid out against Stephen, our story continues into chapter seven/1 Are these things true? The high priest asked. The high priest is likely still Caiaphas, who oversaw the trial of Jesus.
Stephen, under the inspiration and direction of the Holy Spirit, will now deliver an incredible speech that will address the accusations against him by pointing to Israel's history. It will reveal damning patterns of behavior across Israel's history, and it will turn the tables on as accusers, instead proving their guilt before God. As we study through Stephen's speech, remember the charges that have been leveled against him. He's been accused of speaking blasphemous words against Moses and God, and he's been accused of speaking against this holy place, the Temple, and the Law. The overriding charge is blasphemy, punishable by death by stoning.
Specifically, the charges are speaking blasphemy against Moses, God, the Temple, and the Law. Verse two. "Brothers and fathers, he replied. Listen, the God of glory appeared to our father Abraham." Stephen addresses the Sanhedrin as brothers because he's Jewish and so are they.
The use of the term fathers shows respect and recognition of their authority. He refers to Abraham as our father. Remember, in the minds of all Christians at this time, they're still religiously Jewish because they view themselves as simply continuing the Jewish faith by placing their faith in the Jewish Messiah who was prophesied by the Jewish scriptures. They don't view themselves as something different from the temple and the law and all of these things. Stephen acknowledges the God of glory as being the God of Abraham, and he acknowledges Abraham as the father of the nation of Israel.
This was Steven's way of saying, I'm an Orthodox Jew. I worship the God of Abraham, just like you, and any accusation to the contrary is false. He says the God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia before he settled in Harran and said to him, leave your country and relatives and come to the land that I will show you. Then he left the land of the Chaldeans and settled in Haran. From there, after his father died, God had to move to the land in which you are now living.
online today!bcjenny Blog Comments (4,317)
What Makes Jesus Unique? No one else made the claims that He did, He is alive...............
It's wounding. In the same way, you know how much it blesses you when your child is able to see and recognize that you love and care for them. It does happen. I promise it does happen. That's how God feels about the way we interact with Him, and that's why faith is such a big deal to Him.And it's why Hebrew 11:6 declares, that without faith, it is impossible to please God since the one who draws near to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek Him. Here's where things get a little crazy, especially for those of us who have been around the church and the Bible for a while. Scripture teaches God judges people based upon the revelation they have received, not the revelation they have not received. And we can wrap our heads around that as it relates to eternal issues like who gets into heaven.
We can say, oh, okay, that makes sense to me that there will be people in heaven who maybe don't even know the full gospel, but they've responded to what they did know. But here's where it gets crazy, is that this principle can affect even the here and now. God will interact with people differently here and now. Based on how they're responding to the revelation they have received, an incredible number of people with incomplete and horrendously flawed beliefs about God were healed at the hands of Jesus and the apostles. And this happened for two reasons.
Here's why it happened. Number one, they responded in faith to the revelation they had received about God. All some of them knew and understood was that the God Paul was preaching about was the all-powerful God who was greater than all others. God had the power to heal, and he rewards those who seek Him. That's all they knew.
But what did they do with that knowledge? They responded in faith. They did everything they could to make contact with God by touching the hem of Jesus' robe or stealing one of Paul's sweat cloths. They responded in faith to the revelation they had about God, even though that revelation was woefully incomplete. 'Second reason people with bad theology got healed...
Write this down. They placed their faith in the right thing, Jesus. They placed their faith in the right thing, Jesus. Now, we live in a world that wants to believe that if you just believe something strong enough, then it must be true. We hear this when we use phrases like, well, what's true for you is true for you, and what's true for me is true for me.
Or when we talk about phrases like your truth, as though your truth can be different from the truth, and the philosophy behind that is actually the belief. No, if you just believe something strong enough, then it's true.
This is like Disney children's level stupidity. Just believe it. Just wish upon a star and it'll be true. A lot of areas that I could point out, but I'll show some restraint in that area right now. Suffice it to say, that you can believe something with all your heart and be completely wrong, and it will not make it true even if you believe it with all your heart.
Now imagine we're in a plane, and that plane is going down, but we have a chance to jump and land safely. You are given a choice between a parachute or an umbrella to aid you in your journey to the ground. Now, let me ask you if you have all the faith in the world, you believe with all your heart and soul that that umbrella is going to save your life. Does that mean you're loving to jump out the plane and float down like Mary freaking Poppins to the ground? No, of course not.
Why? Because the issue is not, first and foremost, how much faith you have. The issue, first and foremost, is the object you have placed your faith in. A little faith in something powerful will accomplish far more than much faith in something useless. A little faith in something with the power to heal and save you will accomplish a lot more than all the faith in the world in something that cannot heal and cannot save.